Black Marble: “It’s Immaterial” Album Review

Black Marble: “It’s Immaterial” Album Review

A couple years ago a good friend of mine turned me on to a local Brooklyn based artist called Black Marble. At the time their most current album “A Different Arrangement” had already been out for a couple of years. It’s a magical album with a chilled synthwave vibe featuring analog synthesizer tracks laced with minimal bass lines and lo-fi vocals. It was instantly my favorite album for many months and remained in my everyday playlist for even longer. As a former radio DJ, I’m always seeking new underground bands and musical projects to tell friends about and for me Black Marble was that artist I commonly brought up first. But as an underground artist they remained a mystery with very little online presence and no word about any new music. Still I held out hope that they would emerge with something new or even just a live show. Fast-forward to 2016 and I finally came across a social media post from the Ann Arbor, Michigan based label Ghostly International that Black Marble would be releasing a new album later in the year.

The now California based artist Black Marble released their latest album “It’s Immaterial” via Ghostly International in October 2016 to much fanfare. This was much in thanks to excited underground fans like myself and proper promotion from their new label. Fans of the earlier “A Different Arrangement” will not be disappointed in this updated version of Black Marble’s muted darkwave sound. “It’s Immaterial” shares many similarities with the earlier work in that it’s inspiration is drawn from artists like early New Order and The Cure but finds its’ own identity with a modern and unique take on catchy coldwave tracks. It really is an amazing listen from beginning to end and will have synthesizer enthusiasts and dreamwave fans coming together to sing the praises of some really great songwriting.

Black Marble has already played several shows on the West Coast and will be supporting Cold Cave in 2017 for several dates during their WinterTour.Local New Yorkers can catch their performance in Brooklyn on February 9 at Brooklyn Night Bazaar in Greenpoint. See the tour poster below or find Black Marble on Facebook for official dates and times.